of the looming fiscal cliff deadline. it is now just five days away. is there any movement on either side? how many more times can we ask this question of abc chief white house correspondent, jonathan karl, joining us this morning. dare i ask, where we stand this morning? >> reporter: good news and bad news. the president's coming back to washington. the senate's coming back. they're ready to strike a deal. the bad news, josh, no progress whatsoever. and, in fact, the treasury department said that the government on monday will hit the limit of how much money we can borrow to run the government. they're going to do some extraordinary measures to keep us going until february. but things look grim. the one sliver of good news i can say on the substance is, the speaker's office tells me this morning there has been contact between the speaker of the house and the president, at least on the staff level. and they won't say whether or not the two men actually spoke. >> contact. hazahs all around. we heard a lot about taxes that w